Absorb!

The chase lasted about three quarters of an hour before it finally came to a halt.

It had to. Zhu Youning had reached a dead end.

Of course, Zhu Youning hadn't blundered into a dead end in his panic. He hadn't even lost his sense of direction. He had come here for a reason.

He had fled here precisely because he was certain the path ended in a dead end.

Mountains surrounded this place on three sides. The only exit had originally been clear, but it was soon blocked by two people.

They were Li Cunzhong and Li Cunxiao.

Li Cunzhong and Li Cunxiao had pursued him, searching and hunting him down for three quarters of an hour. Now, at last, they had caught up to Zhu Youning.

Li Cunzhong still wore that smug, leering expression, but he was also cold and composed. For some reason, his clothes were speckled with mud, though he hadn't noticed.

At the sound of Li Cunxiao's heavy footsteps, Zhu Youning, standing at the dead end, suddenly tensed all over, then relaxed.

"Zhu Youning, run! Why'd you stop?"

Li Cunzhong sneered triumphantly.

"Run? Why would I run?"

Zhu Youning had been standing with his back to Li Cunzhong and Li Cunxiao. Now he turned around and gazed at them calmly, his expression impassive. "Today, I'm not the one who'll be laid to rest here. You are."

"Keep dreaming."

Li Cunzhong surveyed the surroundings, confirming there was no ambush, then said disdainfully, "Stop deluding yourself. My tenth brother is a Great Heavenly Rank expert! What are you going to use to kill us?"

"Is that so?" Zhu Youning glanced at him. "Haven't you noticed anything strange?"

"Strange? You're just trying to scare us. What else could you have up your sleeve? Reinforcements? Doesn't look like it. Then the only possibility left is poison."

At that, Li Cunzhong chuckled and continued, "But unfortunately for you, my tenth brother has not only mastered formidable external arts, his internal cultivation has also reached the Great Heavenly Rank. His inner strength is so powerful that blades and spears can't pierce him, and neither fire nor water can harm him. Even if you did use some strange poison, with my tenth brother's profound Great Heavenly Rank cultivation and protective true qi, it would take at least an hour for the poison to take effect!"

"What if the poison specifically targets true qi?" Zhu Youning smiled faintly, his smile tinged with mockery. "Without your internal energy, how long do you think a Great Heavenly Rank expert can hold out?"

"What did you say? Without internal energy?"

Li Cunzhong's expression shifted slightly.

Zhu Youning regarded them calmly. "Li Cunxiao's internal strength is indeed profound, but after traveling such a long way, the poison has had time to take effect."

Li Cunzhong's heart jolted. He immediately checked the qi in his dantian. Just then, a sudden discomfort washed over him.

He couldn't help touching his face, his expression stunned.

Was he actually crying?

As they spoke, tears had already been streaming down Li Cunzhong's face, flowing uncontrollably.

But that wasn't the worst of it. If he had only started crying for no reason, that would have been one thing. But along with the tears, his body had gone limp, and he couldn't summon the slightest bit of strength.

Worse still, the internal energy in Li Cunzhong's dantian had almost completely stagnated. He couldn't summon his inner breath, much less circulate it.

"Tenth brother, how are you?"

Li Cunzhong was aghast. He hurriedly looked at Li Cunxiao, only to find that Li Cunxiao was crying too. He had clearly been affected as well.

What was going on? Had they really been poisoned?!

But what kind of poison was this—something unheard of that made people cry?

"You! What did you do? When did you poison us?!"

"Don't worry. I won't tell you."

The situation was already clear, and telling Li Cunzhong the truth wouldn't change anything. But Zhu Youning still wouldn't tell him.

Poison was poison. Who explained the recipe while using it? What if his opponent turned the tables on him? Whose fault would that be?

To think that you had everything under control and tell your opponent all your secrets—that was stupidity! That was aiding the enemy! If they turned around and killed you, you'd have only yourself to blame.

In the world of martial arts, it was best to stay cautious.

Even if no one in this world recognized the poison Zhu Youning had used, there were always greater powers beyond the horizon. He didn't believe that no one could concoct an antidote.

The poison was called Sadness-Soothing Breeze. Zhu Youning had spent 20 practice attempts to redeem it as a one-use consumable.

Sadness-Soothing Breeze was a consumable from I Practice Martial Arts From the Heart. In the game, it caused an enemy's internal energy to stagnate, preventing them from using their inner power. It was mainly used against enemies who relied on internal techniques as their primary means of attack.

In reality, anyone poisoned by Sadness-Soothing Breeze would first feel their whole body go weak. Their internal energy was still there, but they couldn't circulate it. For a while, they could forget about using it.

The method of poisoning was simple, too. After Zhu Youning redeemed the Sadness-Soothing Breeze, he mixed it into a jar of explosives called Volatile Fire, then threw the jar at Li Cunxiao.

Sadness-Soothing Breeze was a gaseous poison stored in a bottle. When the explosion shattered the bottle, it became a colorless, odorless gas that spread through the surrounding area.

Even with a head of bronze and bones of iron, even after surviving a hundred battles without a scratch, Li Cunxiao still had to breathe air. There was no way he could avoid the poison.

"You!"

Li Cunzhong pointed at Zhu Youning, unable to speak. Suddenly, his body jolted.

It turned out that all the internal energy in Li Cunxiao's body had stagnated. He slumped to the ground, causing Li Cunzhong, who had been standing on his broad back, to tumble off.

Li Cunzhong fell awkwardly to the ground, covered in dust and looking terribly weak. Yet his gaze remained sharp as he glared at Zhu Youning with seething hatred.

Zhu Youning had no interest in wasting words with a dying man. He stepped up to Li Cunzhong, struck him in the dantian with a palm, and simultaneously drove the Northern Dark Divine Art to its utmost.

The instant they touched, Li Cunzhong felt a tingling numbness in his dantian. His internal energy rushed out of him and into Zhu Youning's body.

Li Cunzhong tried to push Zhu Youning away, but his limbs were limp and powerless. He couldn't do it.

In the blink of an eye, the internal energy in Li Cunzhong's body surged into Zhu Youning like floodwaters bursting through a breached dam.

"Wh-what kind of demonic art is this? My internal energy!"

Li Cunzhong stared wide-eyed in disbelief. He still wanted to fight back, but he was powerless to do so.

Meanwhile, Zhu Youning clearly felt a warm stream of inner qi appear in his dantian.

It was only a small amount of internal energy, but it would have taken an ordinary person years, even decades, of cultivation to build up. And this was only what he had absorbed in the space of a single breath!

Zhu Youning deliberately increased the rate at which he absorbed the energy, fully driving the Northern Dark Divine Art.

Before long, all the internal energy in Li Cunzhong's dantian had been drained into Zhu Youning's body, where it continuously transformed into his Northern Dark True Qi.

After absorbing Li Cunzhong's internal energy, Zhu Youning immediately felt his own energy rise by a large margin, filling him with a sense of abundance.

No wonder Li Cunzhong was a Great Star Realm expert. The internal energy in him alone far exceeded the combined total of all the undercover Buliangren agents in the Xuanming Cult's Bian Prefecture branch!

If Li Cunzhong, a Great Star Realm expert, was already like this, what about Li Cunxiao, a Great Heavenly Rank expert?